Replication systems typically protect a primary data storage system (often called a production system or production site) by replicating the primary data storage system on a secondary data storage system (often called a replica system or replica site). The production site and the replica site are typically coupled by a communications network such as a wide area network (WAN). Further, replication systems use data optimizations such as data compression and data deduplication algorithms to save WAN bandwidth as well as storage space.
These optimizations, however, require resources of the data storage environment such as central processing unit (CPU) resources and random access memory (RAM) resources. If the data is compressible and there are repeating data blocks, then these optimizations are very cost-effective. However, if the data is not compressible or dedupeable, these optimizations waste CPU and RAM and do not contribute to WAN overhead reduction.